


Untitled (11 January '03)

by Hope



Series: Untitled Lord of the Rings ficlets [5]
Category: Lord of the Rings - Fandom
Genre: Ficlet, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-01-11
Updated: 2003-01-11
Packaged: 2017-10-02 13:31:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hope/pseuds/Hope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>http://hopeful-fiction.livejournal.com/9713.html</p></blockquote>





	Untitled (11 January '03)

He didn't sleep much anymore because sleeping was too much like giving in, surrendering to the thick warmth of a swaddling darkness. And waking was almost too much to bear sometimes; when he found himself already walking, the wet lick of his cloak against his ankles and the sudden pull _down_, heavier than the weight of his hand clasped around It. Sam's expression making him turn away.

_So bright, so beautiful._

And coming awake sometimes to find he'd moved in the night, blinking with eyelids heavy and gritty as he lifted his head, looked around him with vision that seemed to shift and blur.

Smeagol, not far away and watching, always watching, fingers sucked into his mouth and eyes wide and unblinking. His gaze following avidly as Frodo untangled himself from Sam's limbs, struggled out of the heavy weight of confusion with aching muscles.

The candles flickering in the murky water, dirty light against the white faces that he'd first mistaken for his own reflection, seeming warmer to him than the pale glare of the sun through the mists, or his own flesh. The shock of icy water against his skin nothing compared to the chill that curled around his bones as he walked. Rested. Ate.

Sweating, limbs like liquid metal in a forge and fingers numb from a silver-chain tourniquet; remembering nothing but the uneven drumming of his own heart and Sam's, pounding beneath him. Drawing away, moving through air like water and drowning, Smeagol's ever present hissing and muttering, _"They are calling for it . . ."_ He was always watching, with something akin to horrified glee, his knuckles swollen from dark torment and glistening as he bit down on them.

_"Don't follow the lights!"_ \-- A command spat out as they headed east, and the mists shifted and broke into tatters lingering above Frodo's head; travelling more and more at night, before or after the moon had risen to avoid _'the yellow face'_. And the _white face_, because it reflected the gleam of Smeagol's eyes and made gold seem like silver, almost - a sickly stained yellow; and the starlight in Sam's eyes overcome by his shadow.

Frodo didn't sleep much anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> http://hopeful-fiction.livejournal.com/9713.html


End file.
